Coal
Material · MaterialOre0★Turns up in caves and similar spots. High quality metal requires it.
Coal feeds 6 different recipes, which is why it is worth farming past the point you think you need it.
Details
It stacks up to 9,999.
Where to Find Coal
Coal comes out of the ground: there are 824 coal nodes on the Palpagos Islands, and each one grows back a while after you break it, so a good cluster is worth remembering.
3 Pals drop Coal when defeated or captured, which is usually the faster route if you are already out hunting — the drop list below is sorted by how reliably each one gives it up.
It also shows up as world loot — field drops in the Desert, field drops in the Snowfields and field drops in the Sakurajima, usually 1–3 at a time.
Sending a team on the Hidden Sanctum of the Desert, Free Pal Alliance Illicit Trading Post and PIDF Illegal Factory expeditions brings some back without you leaving base.
Coal stops being a field resource once you can build the Coal Quarry. It unlocks at level 37 for 5 Ancient Technology Points, and a single Pal with the Mining work suitability assigned to it will keep the coal flowing at your base with no travel involved. Building one costs 100 Coal, 70 Stone, 30 Paldium Fragment and 10 Ancient Civilization Parts — so the first hundred still has to be mined or shipped in by hand.
Three spots on Palpagos pack enough of the 824 nodes into one patch of ground to be worth a base of their own. The densest is around (22, -153), about 265 m south of the Mount Flopie Summit statue: eight coal nodes and five copper ore deposits inside a 50 m radius, though not a single lumber node, so wood has to come from a second base. The desert coast at (423, 3) trades two coal for convenience — six nodes plus eight stone and four copper in the same radius, with the Dustview Coast statue roughly 25 m away, so every haul back is a teleport. For a late base, (-292, -468) on the volcano's eastern skirt, about 285 m from Foot of the Volcano, holds ten coal within 100 m next to nine paldium outcrops, which covers the 30 Paldium Fragment the Coal Quarry asks for — it is hot ground, so bring heat protection before you settle.
| How | Where | Details |
|---|---|---|
| Mining and gathering | Palpagos Islands — 824 coal nodes | Respawns after you break it |
| Expedition | Hidden Sanctum of the Desert | Normal · 45 min · 100% chance · 20–40 at a time |
| Expedition | Free Pal Alliance Illicit Trading Post | VeryHard · 120 min · 100% chance · 10–20 at a time |
| Expedition | PIDF Illegal Factory | VeryHard · 120 min · 100% chance · 10–20 at a time |
| World loot | Field drops in the Desert | Grade 1 · 14.1% chance · 1–3 at a time |
| World loot | Field drops in the Sakurajima | Grade 1 · 13.0% chance · 1–5 at a time |
| World loot | Field drops in the Snowfields | Grade 1 · 12.8% chance · 1–3 at a time |
Using Coal Well
If you are saving toward that 100-coal build cost and would rather not tour the mining nodes, the Hidden Sanctum of the Desert expedition is the cheapest route: it returns 20–40 coal every run at a guaranteed rate on a 45-minute Normal timer, so three or four dispatches cover the whole quarry.
A coal base only pays off if the deposits sit inside the build circle. Mining Pals work nodes enclosed by the base and drop the ore into nearby storage, but they will not step outside it, so drop the Palbox to swallow the cluster rather than to sit beside it, and staff the base with Mining Pals only — a crew carrying Lumbering will spend its time on the trees instead.
Alternatives and Upgrades
Other crafting materials at a similar tier, for when you want to weigh this against the rest of its class:
